‘Fruitvale’ gets a new title: ‘Fruitvale Station’

In somewhat surprising news, The Weinstein Company has modified the title to Sundance grand jury and audience award winner “Fruitvale.” The crowd-pleasing drama will now be known as “Fruitvale Station.”

The feature film directorial debut of Ryan Coogler, “Fruitvale” follows the last day in the life of Oscar Grant (MIchael B. Jordan), a 22-year-old San Francisco area resident who was fatally shot by BART police officers the morning of Jan. 1, 2009. Oscar winner Octavia Spencer, Chad Michael Murray, Kevin Durand, Melonie Diaz and Ahna O’Reilly also star and Spencer and Forest Whitaker are two of the film’s producers.

“Fruitvale Station” is hardly the first Sundance feature that has changed its title after being acquired for distribution. Most recently 20th Century Fox renamed 2011 coming of age drama “Homework” to “The Art of Getting By,” Lionsgate was forced to change “Push” to “Precious: Based on the novel Push by Sapphire” after a Sci-Fi movie of the same name was released months before and CBS Films just tweaked word of mouth favorite “Toy’s House” to “The Kings of Summer.”

The Weinsteins also chose to remove the THE from Silver Linings Playbook, somehow decided on the horribly titled “Killing Them Softly” late in the game, as well as “Lawless” and another silly one, “The Intouchables”. Just call it “Untouchable”, Harvey.

By: Jonnybon

04.17.2013 @ 8:15 PM

I think Harvey Weinstein is great in many ways, but he meddles too much.

By: Joe7827

04.17.2013 @ 9:25 PM

Nice comparisons, Jonny. In many of those examples, the original titles are better. “The Wettest County in the World” sounds very intriguing; “Lawless” sounds like just another generic police thriller.

By: Lola

04.18.2013 @ 2:52 AM

Hey, Lawless sounds sexy. Quit nitpicking. If the movie’s good, iti’s good regardless of the title…

By: sosgemini

04.18.2013 @ 2:43 PM

I think this new title works better. Fruitvale sounds like it’s about Castro. For those not from the Bay Area, it gives the title a lil more context. Originally, when I learned of the title, I thought, “really?”

By: Laya Maheshwari

09.23.2013 @ 3:09 PM

There are many adjectives one can use for “Fruitvale Station”. “Crowd-pleasing” is not one of them.